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Social support is the physical and emotional comfort given to us by our family, friends, co-workers and others. It is knowing that we are part of a community of people who love and care for us, and value and think well of us. Social support is a way of categorizing the rewards of communication in a particular circumstance. An important aspect of support is that a message or communicative experience does not constitute support unless the receiver views it as such.

The Concept of Social Support

The term “social support” is often used in a broad sense, including social integration. However, Social integration refers to the structure and quantity of social relationships, such as the size and density of networks and the frequency of interaction, but also sometimes to the subjective per-cep¬tion of embeddedness. Social support, in contrast, refers to the function and quality of social relationships, such as perceived availability of help or support actually received. It occurs through an interactive process and can be related to altruism, a sense of obli¬gation, and the perception of reciprocity. Social support in the narrow sense has been defined in various ways. For example, it may be regarded as resources provided by others, as coping assistance or as an exchange of resources. Several types of social support have been investigated, such as in¬stru¬mental (e.g., assist with a problem), tangible (e.g., donate goods), informational (e.g., give advice), and emotional (e.g., give reassurance), among others. Health and well-being are not merely the result of actual support pro-vi¬sion, but are also a consequence of participation in a meaningful social context. Receiving support gives meaning to individuals’ lives by virtue of motivating them to give in return, to feel obligated, and to be attached to their ties. Being embedded in a positive social world might be more powerful than receiving a particular act of help. The most common distinction made is the one between perceived available support and support actually received. The former may pertain to anticipating help in time of need, and the latter to help provided within a given time period. The former is often prospective, the latter always retrospective. This is an essential distinction because these two constructs need not necessarily have much in common. They can be closely related in some studies, but in others they may be unrelated, depending on wording and context. Expecting support in the future may be rather dispositional being intertwined with opti¬mism, whereas support provided in the past is rather based on actual circumstances. To which degree this distinction emerges empirically also depends on the amount of specificity in the item wordings. The more diffuse and general the questions are, the more the responses may be influenced by the respondents' personality characteristics.

Mechanisms of Social Support

In terms of its functional value, social support can have a main effect on various outcomes, or it can interact with the experience of stress. It has been postulated that social support might reveal its beneficial effect on health and emotions only in times of distress, as it buffers the negative impact of stressful events. This moderating impact is known as the stress-buffering effect. Moreover, there are a number of mediator effects that characterize the mechanisms through which social support operates in the stress and coping process, or by which social support is established and maintained. Many studies have demonstrated that social support acts as a moderating factor in the development of psychological and/or physical disease (such as clinical depression or hypertension) as a result of stressful life events. As such, it is a critical component in the assessment of overall well-being. There is growing evidence to suggest that social support affects humans differently throughout life, suggesting that the need to receive and provide social support shifts across development.

References

1. Kenneth S. Kendler, M.D., John Myers, M.S., and Carol A. Prescott, Ph.D. (2005-02), Sex Differences in the Relationship Between Social Support and Risk for Major Depression: A Longitudinal Study of Opposite-Sex Twin Pairs, American Journal of Psychiatry {{citation}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)

Further Reading

Cutrona, C. E. (1996). Social support in couples. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.

Luszczynska, A., Boehmer, S., Knoll, N., Schulz, U., & Schwarzer, R. (2007). Emotional support for men and women with cancer: Do patients receive what their partners provide? International Journal of Behavioral Medicine, 14, 156-163.

Knoll, N., Schwarzer, R., Pfüller, B., & Kienle, R. (2009). Transmission of depressive symptoms in couples undergoing assisted reproduction treatment. European Psychologist, 14, 5-15.

Revenson, T. A., Kayser, K., & Bodenmann, G. (Eds.). (2005). Couples coping with stress: Emerging perspectives on dyadic coping. Washington, DC: American Psychological Association.

Schwarzer, R., & Knoll, N. (2007). Functional roles of social support within the stress and coping process: A theoretical and empirical overview. International Journal of Psychology, 42(4), 243-252.

Schwarzer, R., & Leppin, A. (1991). Social support and health: A theoretical and empirical overview. Journal of Social and Personal Relationships, 8, 99-127.

Taylor, S. E. (2007). Social support. In H. S. Friedman and R. C. Silver (Eds.), Foundations of Health Psychology (pp.145-171). New York, NY: Oxford University Press.

Taylor, S. E., Welch, W. T., Kim, H. S., & Sherman, D. K. (2007). Cultural differences in the impact of social support on psychological and biological stress responses. Psychological Science, 18, 831-837.

Taylor, S. E. (2006). Tend and befriend: Biobehavioral bases of affiliation under stress. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 15, 273-277.

See also

• Miriam Stewart

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